Samsung Health doesn't delete health data when you opt out of AI training

Full text

TL;DR

A recent warning dialog in Samsung Health made it seem like opting out of AI training would disrupt the user experience, deleting “health data” and disabling the syncing of new data.

Samsung has clarified that opting out specifically deletes health data retained for AI training, which is stored separately from other health data.

Opting out of allowing your data to be used for AI training doesn’t actually seem to affect Samsung Health functionality, based on testing.

A troubling new pop-up in Samsung Health started making the rounds yesterday. Users interacting with a toggle to opt out of their health data being used to train AI were greeted with a warning telling them that if they chose not to share their health data for AI training, previously uploaded health data would be deleted, and syncing new health data would no longer be possible. Now, though, it seems that that warning was poorly worded.

SamMobile has shared a clarification from Samsung that explains the warning telling users their “health data will be deleted” is referring specifically to “data that has been separately collected and used for AI development purposes,” not the health data that’s “stored for the use of Samsung Health services.” That being the case, the warning users have been seeing does seem awfully misleading.